Holding Space, Growing Together: A Reflection for Mental Health Awareness Month
Honoring the Journey
May is Mental Health Awareness Month, and I want to take a moment to honor something sacred: the courage it takes to sit in the therapy room, whether as a client or a clinician. As a Marriage and Family Therapist, I’ve been privileged to hold space for others through their growth, pain, and transformation. And in doing so, I’ve grown too.
Still Healing, Still Growing
To be honest, I’m still healing, learning, and evolving. That doesn’t make me less of a therapist, it makes me human. It reminds me that healing isn’t a destination, but a process. Therapy isn’t about “fixing” people. It’s about walking with them. And in many ways, walking myself back home, too.
Like many of you, my path wasn’t linear. It was layered with grief, strength, resilience, and questions about what healing truly looks like. Therapy has taught me and continues to teach me that while trauma is real and deserves care, not everything is trauma. Sometimes, it’s life. Sometimes, it’s growth. Sometimes, it’s a shifting of beliefs we’ve carried for too long.
As a Black woman and therapist, I carry personal experience, cultural history, and professional knowledge into every session. And still, I am learning.
A New Narrative for Mental Health
In many communities, especially communities of color, therapy has long been stigmatized or misunderstood. But that’s changing. More of us are showing up for ourselves. Therapy is becoming a space not just for surviving trauma, but for growing beyond it. For becoming more fully ourselves.
Mental Health Awareness Month is not just about disorders and diagnoses (because Google and ChatGPT got some in a chokehold, naming and claiming all sorts of things). It’s about recognition. It’s about honoring the quiet work of healing, the small wins that no one sees, the families and communities we create when we make space for one another, but most importantly, for ourselves.
In Gratitude
This month, I honor the work both mine and yours. To my clients past and present, thank you. Sitting with your stories, your silence, your laughter, your grief, your breakthroughs, and even your resistance has been an honor. It has helped shape me, not just as a therapist, but as a person. I don’t take it lightly that you’ve trusted me with your story. We have grown together. I celebrate every person who has chosen to heal. We are not alone in this. We are still healing. Still becoming. And we are doing it together.
With gratitude,
Kamili Wade-Reescano, LMFT, MS
